The Steep and Thorny Way To Heaven
by alyseci5
Summary: Abby knew they'd been in worse situations, even if she couldn't think of any right now.


**Pairing:** Abby/Connor

**Spoilers:** Set post 3.08 - brief spoilers for canon character deaths

**Disclaimer:** Primeval and its characters belong to Impossible Pictures. No copyright infringement is intended. This is fanfiction, written solely for love of the show.

**Author's Notes:** Written for wilemina_29's kissing meme request of Abby/Connor in a garden shed, which I shamelessly also used for my kissbingo **card** square 'emotion: surprise'. Thanks go to Aithine for the beta. Title is a quote from Hamlet and uttered by Ophelia. Which is a bit foreboding for Abby and Connor, when you think about it.

-o-

Abby knew they'd been in worse situations, even if she couldn't think of any right now. The future predator, maybe - watching it skitter towards her while Stephen's body pressed hers into the wall and his hand kept the whimpering inside her mouth. Or seeing it go for Connor, trying to rip him out of the car before ripping him into pieces, and finding the courage from somewhere - anywhere - to throw that rock and buy Connor some time.

But that had been when she'd known that Cutter and Stephen were out there, somewhere, ready rush in where even fools didn't venture let alone angels. Ready to rush in and save the pair of them, just like Abby and Connor would have done if they'd been able.

This time, all she had was Connor, just as brave in his own way as either of the two men they'd lost, but - as fond as Abby was of him - he could be a bit crap in a crisis.

He wasn't exactly panicking, but his eyes kept darting between her and the door, his breathing rapid and shallow. Abby kept her eyes focused firmly on the **door** - one of them had to, even if there was no guarantee that something wasn't going to come crashing through the window instead. Which was why she also kept her hands wrapped firmly around the rake she held. As weapons went, it was about as much use in a crisis as Connor, but at least it stopped her from falling apart completely, or wrapping her fingers around his bloody stupid **neck**.

"You do realise that I was fine, don't you?" she hissed, not even looking at him. Connor cleared his throat, and she scowled firmly at the door. She **wasn't** going to look at him, not right now, even if that was more than a little unfair. "I didn't need you to rush in and **piss it off**!" Connor shifted uncomfortably and she shifted her glare momentarily from the door to him, just long enough to shut him up before he even started. When the message appeared to sink home, it was back to the door getting the full force of her glare again.

"Sorry," he murmured and winced when she glared at him again. His eyes were wide, irises ringed with white, and his face was too pale. He swallowed and shifted his stance nervously and she resisted the urge to tell him to keep bloody still.

She was scared, and her hip ached and stung from where she'd hit the ground before Connor had dragged her up and half-carried her to safety, but that was no reason to take it out on Connor. She took in a deep breath.

"Sorry," she said gruffly, twisting the rake in her hands, round and round while she avoided his eyes. "I know you were just..."

"Yeah." Connor's face was scratched, too, although in his case it was carelessness in pushing back branches from the overgrown rose bushes that half hid the shed they were now cowering in like rats in a hole. "Some rescue, though."

He gave a sheepish little twitch of his shoulders and her face softened. "Becker will find us," she said, taking a small step towards him. "Or Danny, maybe. They'll be looking." He gave a small smile before seeming to swallow down all of his fear, or at least enough of it to stiffen his spine and firm his grip on his spade.

"Let's just hope that they don't piss it off even more, then," he said weakly. As jokes went it fell a little flat, but, still, it was a joke. She was still searching for the right words to answer him, and silence that little guilty voice in her mind that she was being too hard on him, when something moved outside the small, grimy window, blocking out the light for a moment - something large and feathery/furry (she still wasn't sure which it was, and it had been moving so **fast**) and probably hungry.

She froze and felt Connor freeze next to her, his breath catching in his throat. It was tempting, so tempting, to sway towards him - for his comfort, or hers, she wasn't sure which.

"So," said Connor, his voice high-pitched and breathy. "Now would be a good time for the cavalry to turn up." When she turned her head to tell him to keep quiet - there was an outside chance that that thing, whatever it was, didn't understand that this rather ramshackle shed was something that tasty things could be hiding inside - he was **right there**.

That thing outside thumped down on the ground - its tail, if that's what it was, or its third leg or whatever - and let out a sound that wasn't quite a roar, more a low, rumbling, sub-vocal sound that went right the way through her, shivering up her spine and echoing in her head. Connor's eyes widened even further, and he let out a sound of his own - an 'uh', a little burst of breath like something had punched him in the stomach, not hard enough to knock him over but hard enough for him to feel it. He took one hand off his spade, steadying it before it could clang down onto the floor and warn that thing that something was lurking, tiny and afraid, in here, and then reached for her.

She leant in towards him, meaning it as comfort - again for him or her, she wasn't sure - but he slid his free hand up into her hair and pulled her tightly to him. The feel of his lips landing on hers knocked her breath out of her, and the sound she let out as his mouth moved on hers echoed his little, lost 'uh'. His lips were chapped and dry, but it didn't matter; the rake wavered in her grip as she fought the urge to let it drop, throw it away and hold tight onto Connor, never let him go.

Connor was the first to break free, turning his head as something large shifted position, far too close to them for comfort. His fingers flexed against her scalp, soft and thoughtless, all of his attention now focused outside.

She stepped away, her heart hammering in her chest in a way that had nothing to do with fear of being eaten or ripped wide open by something with teeth and claws; this fear wasn't that rational. It was all about the taste of Connor, slightly sour with fear and too many Doritos on the ride over, and the feel of his body pressed against hers.

"What the hell...?" she breathed, harsh and furious, but as quiet as she could manage. Connor still flinched, leaning back away from her. "You have to do this now?"

"I thought..." he stammered, and the fear flitted across his face again, leaving something shattered and terrified behind. "I didn't want to die without..."

She pushed him, not hard enough to knock him over, not hard enough to even bruise, but just hard enough to rock him on his feet for a moment, his face stunned. "At least when I kissed you I waited until we were **out**of danger instead of..." She flailed, fingers twisting and jerking, and Connor switched from eyeing her to eyeing her rake, with some (probably justified, given how she was (over)reacting) trepidation. "God, Connor, you really pick your bloody times."

"Um..."

"Of all the..." Words failed her, at least until she gathered her thoughts enough to lean right into his ear and hiss, "There is something out there that wants to **eat us**and you..."

"Um..."

"You couldn't have waited until we were back at the ARC, or... or... bought me bloody dinner or something?"

"Um..."

She should stop, keep her voice lower, but he was so flaming frustrating. "You... you... you...!" she breathed, the warmth rising from his skin and matching the flush - half-fury and half-something else - that was blossoming across her face.

"Abby... "

She wasn't listening, didn't want to listen to him when her heart was still beating, fast and furious, and all she wanted to do was pull him closer to her, push him away like the frustrating and infuriating... **man**he was. But he still wouldn't shut up.

"Abby...is that gunfire?"

She pulled back and blinked at him, completely thrown. But then... yes. Echoing back to her, first just on the cusp of hearing, but then - magically, wonderfully - coming closer, was a steady rat-a-tat of weapons fire. She was far too familiar with it now; Lester was going to have a hard time explaining a pitched gun battle in outer suburbia, especially given that he still didn't quite have Jenny's grasp of spinning a believable yarn.

"Um... should we...?"

Connor flinched again at the look on her face, the hand he'd extended in an 'after you' gesture wilting until it hung, limp and useless, by his side.

It took a superhuman effort but she managed to resist the urge to make an unfavourable comparison between him and the state of his hand. She could still taste him, that was the problem. Could still feel the imprint of his lips where they had pressed against hers.

"You," she spat out, her eyes narrowing as Connor swallowed nervously, "are buying me dinner. And!" The word was snapped out hard enough to get Connor to close his mouth again, his expression warring between 'scared and stunned' and 'hopeful (and stunned)'. "Takeways don't count."

She stalked the three steps it took her to get to the shed door, throwing it open dramatically (at least once a peek through the gap showed her that the cavalry had, indeed, arrived). There was something large and furry/feathery (which **was**it? She still couldn't tell) lying flat on the ground, looking about as stunned as Connor, but with the added variant of Becker looming over it, looking far too much like the Lo! the Mighty Hunter for her to take seriously now that the immediate danger was past.

"Don't think you're getting lucky on the first date either," she shot back towards Connor as she strode out into the sunlight.

She didn't need to turn around to know that Connor was grinning, but at least Becker had the good common sense to stay silent when she glared in his general direction.

One of them could be trained, anyway.

The End


End file.
